Home Secretary David Blunkett wants police and probation officers to use satellite-tracking for convicts released on licence and offenders given community sentences.

He plans to allow them to use lie detectors to make sure sex offenders are keeping to the conditions of their release. And he wants to beef up a new database that allows officers to share information on violent and sex offenders.

Mr Blunkett revealed the plans at a meeting in Oxford last night. He will give details of them during a trip to Sheffield with the Prime Minister today.

The Government is already piloting the use of satellite-tracking of offenders who are released on licence.

But Mr Blunkett wants to change the law to extend it to those given community sentences, focusing on sex offenders and those found guilty of domestic abuse.

The Home Secretary also wants to make further use of lie detectors to ensure sex offenders are not breaking the terms of their release.

The idea has already been trialled and the Home Office says it has proved particularly valuable to probation officers. Mr Blunkett has apparently not made a firm decision on such plans, but has indicated he wants to push ahead.

He also intends to make more use of the Violent and Sex Offenders Register. The national IT database allows police and probation officers to share the latest information on offenders, including risk assessments.

A spokesman for Mr Blunkett said: "A third term Labour Government would make very progressive use of satellite-tracking and possibly lie detector tests as part of a focused programme to tackle offenders."

Mr Blunkett said pilot projects with lie detectors in the North-east of England had brought good results. He told BBC Radio: "I think satellite tracking as part of the new supervision procedures that we laid out in the Criminal Justice and Sentencing Act would be a great safeguard, not just for sex offenders but for those repeat and prolific offenders which make our lives a misery, where serious crime is being committed.

"But we can also use satellite tracking for very minor offences where we are worried about people being on community sentences but where our jails would simply be filled up in an unnecessary fashion."

He added: "We can try lie detectors in terms of the monitoring of sex offenders and we can link that with bringing together the sex offenders register and the violent offenders register so that we have a national computer database."